Kakivak stands behind its programs at QIA’s AGM

“Kakivak is not immune to budget cuts”

SAMANTHA DAWSON

The Qikiqtani Inuit Association is meeting this week in Iqaluit at the Anglican Parish Hall. (PHOTO BY SAMANTHA DAWSON)

The community and economic development arm of the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, the Kakivak Association, is getting ready to change the way that it spends money due to federal budget cuts, said the chair of the organization’s board, Larry Audlaluk.

Audlaluk presented Oct. 1 at the QIA’s annual general meeting in Iqaluit on the association’s activities over the past year.

“Our money, as you saw in the report, we can’t just do what we want with it because a lot of it is federal money and there are restrictions that we have to adhere to,” Audlaluk told Nunatsiaq News.

Like any organization in the North and in the country, “Kakivak is not immune to budget cuts,” he said.

However, Kakivak was not without success this year, he added: it launched a new employment resource centre program equipped with computers and in-person resumé-writing help, in 13 communities this past June.

Kakivak spent more than two-thirds of its money on programs, with 12 per cent going to non-salary operating costs and 14 per cent to wages and benefits.

Program spending in 2011-12 was $6.12 million, up $448,000 from 2010-11.

Operating costs this fiscal year were $2.43 million, down $248,000 from the previous year.

Kakivak receives most of its money from Human Resources and Skills Canada Development, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada, the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency and the QIA.

That adds up to about $9 million altogether.

As for the new career centres, it’s too early to know how much these are being used, Audlaluk said, because they’re so new.

“We shall know the full result by next year, and we’re going to be going through the process of reporting [them],” he said.

That kind of employment and training resource is “a positive step in the right direction, it is a need that has been needed for awhile,” Audlaluk said.

But because Nunavut is “such a huge geographical place to work with, there have always been hindrances.”

This is because many people can’t always come to Iqaluit for training opportunities.

That’s why Kakivak hired the community liaison officers in all 13 communities that it serves.

Audlaluk is optimistic: “it has to work,” he said.

Other big events for Kakivak included its participation in last winter’s Northern Lights conference in Ottawa.

“It was good and exposed us to other Inuit in other provinces and beneficiaries,” he said.

But the Nunavut trade show in Iqaluit is the best one for Kakivak because “we see different kinds of people from different parts come to the North and see the Kakivak booth.”